A great night’s sleep is vital to ensuring guests are well rested and ready to enjoy a cruise ship’s diverse attractions. With space of the essence and a range of accommodation requirements to meet, sofa beds play a key role within some staterooms, but traditional models can be uncomfortable and quick to break. Neil Owens, president of Axess Direct – the innovators of Cozy Mattress – explains how ‘real-bed technology’ can provide guests with the quality recharge they need.
How did you create the concept of Cozy Mattress?
Neil Owens: Our company was founded in 2002, and we spent the first few years in product development, listening to the industry, engineering and testing. Our objective has always been to make people comfortable, one sofa bed at a time. We really capitalise on innovation, aiming to fit as much comfort as possible into a small space: our tagline is ‘the modern sofa bed solution’.
Why do you think Cozy Mattress is such a success in the hospitality industry?
I think our success is associated with the level of sheer comfort, innovation and durability that we bring into the industry. Comfort is a big factor; for example, we actually find that customers who have slept on our beds in hotels come and seek us out to ask where they can buy one at retail.
Hotels also appreciate our clever optimisation of space. Our new innovation, Sleep Between the Arms, leaves a smaller footprint in the room compared with traditional sleepers.
The products’ life cycles are also very impressive. One item that has really taken off is our patented, replaceable zip-top renewable system, designed for folding beds. This means that if the mattress becomes soiled, environmental services can just replace the pillow top, completely refreshing the bed and extending the product life cycle.
Time is another huge advantage we offer, with our sofas taking little more than a minute to convert into fully-made beds, and under a minute to return to comfortable sofas.
How does Cozy Mattress overcome common issues like the ‘bar-in-the-back’ problem that traditional sofa beds present?
We offer a real-bed system for sofas, which means unparalleled comfort. In traditional sofa beds, the small size of the cavity into which mattress and mechanism fold away often leads to discomfort, with a common ‘bar-in-the-back’ problem in the sleeping position. We’ve overcome this issue with our patented Z-Spring Technology that enables us to put real-bed comfort into a small space.
Because it sleeps like a real bed, we’ve tested it to real bed standards – which a lot of our competitors just don’t do – and the model has passed a ten-year test cycle for static mattresses.
Our technology also allows us to offer excellent seating performance. For example, our Sleep Between the Arms product features 161 sitting springs.
Another common issue can be the foot support, which is typically not designed to withstand the weight of an average adult. Cozy Mattress addressed this issue with an engineered bed frame that includes a more durable solid-core rivet assembly and a foot support strut to support the end-of-the-bed bar that the hospitality industry favours.
What has inspired you to move towards the cruise industry, and why do you feel Cozy Mattress is a good fit?
We’ve had tremendous success in land-based hospitality, which accounts for a vast majority of our growth, and we can really see a place for our product within floating hospitality. Nowhere is comfort more important than at sea, with guests needing a good night’s sleep so they can enjoy the excitement of their itinerary and the exciting on-board attractions. Our real-bed technology provides guests with the comfort they need for a quality recharge, while maximising upon space. We can also tailor our solutions to meet the requirements and design standards of a cruise line.
We are innovators, who truly listen to our customers and engineer accordingly. I think that’s really where our success lies – that we look to the industry, develop and test, and are always ready to solve problems.
